The Supersuckers aren’t looking to get rich. Their reward is the rock.

Unlikely Payoffs

Supersuckers bassist-singer Eddie Spaghetti wears his good-timing rocker bravado with pride because it’s landed him a steady job he loves. Maybe his in-your-face, big chord band isn’t rich, but that’s OK; they get paid off in weird times and unlikely chances.

“We don’t make millions,” the amiable Spaghetti says of his Seattle-based band. “We just get these moments.”

One such payoff high on Spaghetti’s list is the band’s seemingly incongruous ongoing performing relationship with country great Willie Nelson. Through mutual friends, the Motorhead-Ramones-styled Supersuckers met the Lefty Frizzell-Hank Williams-influenced Nelson four years back in Austin and cut a tune with the ever-adventurous Willie.

Spaghetti says they quickly forged a friendship based on a “mutual love of left-of-center things,” and Nelson has since twice invited the band to play Farm Aid and his July Fourth picnics. Spaghetti also counts working with master song-crafter Steve Earle a rare and seemingly unlikely treat.

Experiences such as playing Farm Aid and working with music business legends are surprising because between these moments, the band revels in the unhinged, hellbent rock persona portrayed in the songs of their latest CD, “The Evil Powers of Rock ‘n’ Roll.”

“Liquor, women, drugs and killing. Yep,” Spaghetti says, describing the band’s musical themes. He’s proud the Supersuckers carry on in the wake of Kiss and Thin Lizzy, no matter how contrived it may sound to some.

“I liked the cartoon-type bands,” he explains with wise-guy aplomb. Spaghetti — a nickname he got as a kid — says that when he and Tucson, Ariz., high school pals Dan Bolton, Dan Eagle and Ron Heathman formed the band in the late 1980s, they just wanted to rock like AC/DC and throw the rules out the window. Quickly finding Tucson stifling, the band moved to Seattle in May 1989. Spaghetti says it made more sense than moving to San Francisco or Los Angeles.

“We were just whippersnappers …. We thought we could wear our leather jackets more there.

“(And) whoever heard of a band from Seattle?” he continues. “We thought we’d go there and blow everybody away.”

Of course, the guys initially found themselves outsiders to the exploding Seattle grunge scene. But they found gigs, eventually cut some independent-label records, and through the ’90s, they’ve plowed ahead touring hard, playing harder and partying hardest. Lyrics from one song on the new record put the Supersuckers’ world view in a nutshell: “You say cliché/I say classic/You know all we’ll ever have is today/What the hey?…/It’s all stuff and nonsense anyway.”

If all of this is perceived as a fast-and-loose game plan for career success rooted in the image of the hard-living rock star, Spaghetti couldn’t care less. He’s just happy to play his music and get a shot at being every parent’s worst nightmare.

“I’m happy to be in control of (my musical) destiny,” Spaghetti concludes.

“It’s definitely the most kick-ass job you can

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